Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
All of the Dragonkin sat in chairs on the command deck of the ship.
They had summoned me here for an emergency meeting after we’d left Porantine.
I glanced at Gage and knew he’d ratted me out when he kept his eyes focused on anything except me.
“I think it’s time you told us a bit more about yourself,” Preston said.
I folded my arms across my chest. “I’ve only known you two days. I don’t think I need to say anything.”
“You put my friends in danger,” Preston said.
I shook my head. “No, they put themselves in danger. I told them to leave me behind and to let me handle it. They chose to stay and endanger themselves.”
“Why did the Underlord of Porantine think he had a claim to you?” Gage asked.
“You really want to know? That’s a pretty long conversation that involves a lot of back story.” I didn’t actually want to give them the full story, but since they’d been put in danger and Gage had refused to sell me, even for such a high amount, part of me felt like I owed it to them.
“Yes, we really want to know,” Zeke said.
“Where are we headed?” I asked first.
“Far from Porantine,” Wayne answered as he typed on a laptop, lights reflecting quickly on his face. “We don’t want to risk those creatures coming after you again.”
“Or the Hunters,” Preston said.
“You know about them?” I asked, my eyes wide. Usually only the locals knew about them.
“We spent a few months on Porantine at one point,” Preston answered.
“What were you doing on Porantine for that long?” I asked. And why hadn’t I seen them? Oh, they’d probably been there while I was locked up in Charles’s lab.
“We were on Porantine searching,” Zeke answered.
“Searching for …” I probed.
“You tell us what you’re looking for and we’ll tell you what we’re looking for,” Wayne said without pulling his eyes away from his computer screen.
I scoffed and rolled my eyes. “Lame.”
“Come on, out with it,” Zeke growled.
“I need a chair,” I said.
Preston pressed a button on the arm of his chair and a new chair popped up behind me.
Well, that had happened faster than I thought it would.
After sitting, I folded my hands in my lap and took a deep, cleansing breath. Screw it, I would tell them the gist of my life so that they couldn’t say I hadn’t warned them.
“My name isn’t Diamond. My real name is Princess Xoe Zarmascas.
My planet and my people were destroyed and I am the only one left.
Had my parents not realized what was happening and sent me away, I would be dead, too.
My escape pod landed on Porantine. Penniless, homeless, starving, and hiding from those who annihilated my planet, I became a beggar and a thief at the age of ten.
Charles found me and offered me what I thought was salvation.
A warm bed, food, and all I had to do was help him with his experiments.
His explanation did not include that I would become one of his experiments. ”
Zeke growled.
“I was one of his subjects for five years. Unfortunately for him, his work was good and I used my new abilities to escape,” I continued. “I hid on the ship that was leaving the soonest.”
“What is it that you’re searching for?” Preston asked.
“You first. I told you my backstory,” I countered.
“How much do you know about Dragonkin?” Preston asked.
I felt a sense of déjà vu, but answered anyway.
“You shift into dragons. Breathe fire. For the past decade and a half, your population has diminished due to having a much higher male birth rate than female and the fertility rate of males in general has greatly decreased. Rumor says that due to this, you’re more likely to have one female share multiple men in hopes that having so many males will ensure the female ends up pregnant. ”
He nodded. “Yes. This is why we also often form quartets.”
Ah, that explained their group then.
“Our quartets are formed by us all sharing one—”
The ship’s alarm blared and the screen behind me lit up with an image of a large, black ship, with wings that had sharp points on the ends and a red skull poorly painted across the front.
“Uh oh,” I whispered.
Only one type of crew used those ships …
Mercenaries.
“You are so troublesome,” Preston whispered and shook his head.
I would have argued that they might not have been there for me, but the next second, one of the mercenaries appeared on the screen. One I knew, but couldn’t remember the name of.
The mercenary was a squidsan, humanoids with squid heads and tentacles covering their mouths.
They were very easily angered and very quick to kill anyone that they disliked.
This one was dark grey in color and had golden earrings through each of its tentacles.
One of the tentacles was very short from it being cut off during a fight, but he’d pierced a golden ring through it to ensure it matched the rest. “Hand over the girl and we will allow you to live,” he said.
My eyes stayed glued to the Dragonkin to watch their reactions; to see the moment they decided to give me up, so I could run as fast as I could and attempt to get into an escape pod.
“No,” Preston said firmly. “You have ten seconds to leave or we will take this as an act of war and blow your ship up.”
The squidsan mercenary sighed. “She really isn’t worth dying for, Dragonkin.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Wayne said, finally looking up from his computer. “The only way you’ll get her from us is to kill us all.”
Wh-What? Why would he say something like that? He didn’t even know me!
Wayne pulled a tablet from a satchel I hadn’t seen around his back and brought up what looked like schematics of the ship we were facing. He nodded at Preston, some silent communication occurring between them.
“Ten million credits,” the squidsan offered.
“No,” Preston replied immediately. He hadn’t even considered it, not even for a second.
“It’s a sad day when men fall prey to a woman. Seeing as we need her alive to collect on our bounty, I’ll give you one more chance. Hand her over or we destroy you and your ship.”
They needed me alive? Who wanted me alive? Charles was dead.
“Charles is dead,” I told him.
The mercenary looked at me. “Aye, we know.”
“Who hired you?” I asked.
“Come onto our ship and we’ll tell you.” He tried to give me a reassuring smile, but I could practically see the credit symbol dancing in his eyes.
I held up my middle finger in response and gave him a bright smile.
“Fire!” the mercenary yelled and his image disappeared from the screen.
“Destroy them,” Preston said with a vicious smile.
Gage, Wayne, and Zeke hit buttons on their chairs at the same time. Their chairs fell down through the floor of the ship and the floor closed over the top of them.
I leapt out of my chair and gave it the side eye. “What are they doing? Where did they go?”
“Come, sit,” Preston invited me and stood out of his seat.
“No way. I don’t know where you sent them. I don’t want to get ejected out of the airlock or something.”
He sighed. “You really think they would have ejected themselves? Or that I would eject you?”
“Why are you four protecting me? You could sell me for a fortune.” Not that I wanted to be sold, but I wanted to know his reasons. What was their motive behind protecting me from the mercenaries? “He offered you ten million credits and you didn’t blink.”
Movement outside the window caught my eye and made me turn.
Three giant dragons in three different colors, green, red, and blue, with large webbed wings, flew through space, straight at the mercenary ship.
“Aren’t they going to suffocate?” I asked. Fear for their safety caused my heart to speed up.
“No,” Preston replied simply, appearing completely unconcerned and almost bored.
The dragons stopped on different sides of the ship and simultaneously released a purple magic from their mouths. It looked like lightning, but when it hit the ship, it didn’t spark or burn. No, the ship just … imploded. One minute it was there and the next it was gone.
Like I had dreamed the entire thing.
“Where did the ship go?” I asked even though I knew it was a stupid question since I had watched it happen.
“Disintegrated,” Preston said.
“The entire ship and its crew?” I swallowed around a lump in my throat. That type of power was almost unheard of.
He nodded.
The three dragons flew back towards our ship and a few moments later, the floor opened and the three chairs with Wayne, Gage, and Zeke returned to their places.
“No one knows you are capable of this type of destruction,” I whispered, “do they?”
“No,” Preston said. “If they knew, we’d be hunted and used as weapons in wars we don’t believe in.”
I sat down hard on the chair as my legs gave out and exhaled. “What have I gotten myself into?”
“So, you are royalty and—”
“Was,” I corrected. “I don’t have a planet to rule over. Or people. Or a crown.”
I missed my tiara.
I missed a lot of things from my previous life. My parents most of all.
“How did you not suffocate out there?” I asked. “Or freeze to death.”
“Dragonkin have higher body temperatures, due to being able to create fire at will. So, the coldness of space doesn’t affect us.
Plus, our scales are very hard. Also, we can hold our breaths for a very long time,” Wayne explained, a tablet back in his hands.
He clearly had an affinity for technology, since he was always glued to it.
“Our bodies are designed to handle space for short periods of time, though we haven’t dared test the extent, we know we can survive at least five minutes out there. ”
“You four continue to surprise me,” I whispered.
“And you continue to cause us problems,” Preston said. “So, how about you tell us how many people are after you?”
“Quantifying that is very difficult,” I mumbled. Tapping my lips as I thought, I finally answered, “Half of the universe?”
“Half of the … universe?” Wayne asked, eyes wide as he looked up from his tablet to meet my gaze.
I shrugged and tried not to smile. “I traveled a lot.”
Preston threw his head back and laughed. “Oh, pet, you are so intriguing.”